Originally published in Outpost Magazine

Beating swords into ploughshares takes on a new meaning in Taiwan's Kinmen islands, where an ancient craft turns the steel teeth of history into things of beauty.

The twin prop dips its wings to the right as we near our destination. Raindrops streak sideways across the airplane windows. Looking out, the Taiwanese islands of Kinmen play hide and seek beneath our wing as the captain fights some turbulence. The plane steadies and China rises in my window's upper left hand corner.

"Not very good weather this time of year," says a fellow passenger. It's November and rough waves roll to surf along the jagged coastline, creating a white border around the island like the frame of a photograph. Heavy winds try to push us off course as we make our final approach. With bags in hand, I step onto the tarmac and rush towards the arrival gate where the driver waits. We hop into the van and take off along winding roads. Sorghum fields and temples whistle by, and soldiers with shoulder-slung rifles run their daily routines.

The area known as Kinmen is made up of 15 mostly flat islands and islets that lie 200 kilometres west of Taiwan. The largest island, also named Kinmen, and the second largest, Liehyu - sometimes called "Little Kinmen" - are the only two open for tourism.

Within an Olympic swimmer's distance, only two kilometres away, sits mainland China's Fujian province, which squeezes the group of islands on three of its four sides. Under watchful eyes, Chinese and Taiwanese fishing boats share the ocean, bobbing like corks and reeling in their catches of lobster, crab and fish.

Kinmen is a lot closer to China than to the rest of Taiwan. Due to its strategic position, Kinmen was only opened to tourism in 1992 after years of military rule. Up until that year, there were 100,000 soldiers patrolling the area; today there are only 12,000 stationed here, and hardly visible.

It wasn't always this amicable. In 1949 the Chinese Civil War descended on the islands. Chinese Nationalists led by Chiang Kai-shek retreated to Kinmen and transformed it into a front-line defense position against Mao Zedong's encroaching Communists. Many battles ensued, but it wasn't until 1958 that the real assault began. China pounded Kinmen for 44 days with more than 475,000 bombs in total. Propaganda bombs rained pro-communist leaflets down on the inhabitants of Kinmen every other night for the next 20 years. A typical leaflet, showing a smiling Chinese couple, read: "Don't waste your life." But brochures such as these were not enough to make the Taiwanese surrender.

The 1958 bombing of Kinmen left the main island with hundreds of ruined buildings. Over time these were rebuilt. Twenty years of non-stop shelling, however, left the islands not only with an expensive mess, but also an unexpected souvenir and resource. The propaganda bombs were made of stainless steel. In the hands of industrious entrepreneurs that high-quality steel formed the basis of what would become a thriving industry: Knife-making.

Wu Tseng-dong is one such entrepreneur, the most eminent knife-maker on the island. When we meet, he greets me with a broad smile and a firm handshake and he ushers me into his shop. The factory is located behind a door in the back of the shop: the Chin Ho Li Steel Knife Factory. Impressively laid out like a high-end downtown Taipei store, bright lights focus on spotless glass cases, displaying knives of all types and sizes. From decorative art pieces with long, thin blades and intricate leather woven handles, to small switchblades and expensive kitchen knives, there is a blade for every purpose and taste

On the walls are photographs of many famous chefs he has sold his wares to over the years.

Wu is an unusually tall, bespectacled middle-aged man. He is also the third generation to lead the family blacksmithing business. When he was a kid during the 1960s, Wu worked the forge bellows when he got back from school, serving as his father's assistant in the smithy. "In those days, production was very limited," says Wu. "But the knives we made were highly regarded, and would often be bought by soldiers stationed on the island and brought back to their homes in other parts of Taiwan. That's how our reputation grew."

Before the bombs, the family made agricultural implements. But the years of leaflet bombings provided them with a new and improved way of making a living. "Mostly we made butcher's knives. In the beginning, we would only take money after a person had used the knife and found it satisfactory. If it was unsatisfactory, we would replace it with another."

Behind the sanitized and fluorescent display area of Wu's store is his workshop which he invited me to enter. Looking around I wonder if anything has changed since Wu opened his shop three decades ago. Sunlight steals in from yellow-stained windows lining the back of the warehouse. Steel shavings dust the floor and several paint-chipped grinding and polishing machines rest at the back. Red coals burn, patiently waiting in the furnace for the next plunge of steel. Stockpiled in the middle of the concrete floor are hundreds of bombshells, waiting to become knives.

"What happens when you run out," I ask. "I have enough for 30 more years of production," he says confidently.

Each shell casing will produce 50 to 60 kitchen knives. Wu gets the shells from locals, who dig them up and bring them to the shop. Originally one propaganda bombshell would fetch a price of NT$20 (0.72 cents CAN. Now, years after the last bomb fell, new large-scale discoveries only happen when a whole building is excavated. This has made the price swell to over NT$1000 ($35 CAN) per bomb. Wu estimates his family has collected 100,000 shells over the years, which means they're sitting on a potential fortune - and that's before the bombs are transformed into high-priced knives.

Part of the appeal of Kinmen knives is their connection to history. But they are also popular because they are forged by hand. "There is no comparison with mass-produced knives that are simply cut and ground from a metal board," Wu says. "It is the hand-forging process that gives these knives their hardness and their ability to hold an edge."

With a woommp, he lights a blowtorch, sits down, lays a bombshell on its side and begins cutting out a shape. Sparks fly. When he's done he has a piece of tarnished steel that barely resembles a knife. Grabbing tongs, he stirs up the coals while pumping air into the furnace. He plunges the steel into the red hot ambers, waits and pulls it out when the steel glows bright yellow. Like a man on fire, he spins around and places the steel on a solid round metal post and hammers, first one side, then the other. Again, he turns and sinks the steel into the hot bed, waits, takes it out and hammers.
Bang, bang. Spin. Pump, pump. Wait.
Bang, bang. Spin. Pump, pump. Wait.

Repeating this dance a half a dozen times, the steel slowly gives way under the pressure and begins to take shape. "We must judge the heat of the steel very accurately," says Wu, "because the color of the red-hot steel tells us what we need to know. This is part of the secret knowledge of our business. It all has to be judged very accurately."

With the hammer and coals having done their jobs, he dumps the steel into water to cool it before the shaping and polishing process begins. Turning on the grinding machine, he takes the steel and places the blade lengthwise against the spinning granite wheel. Sparks stream like a waterfall in all directions as he rhythmically moves the blade back and forth. Satisfied that he has the shape he wants, he moves over to the polishing machine, which looks similar to the grinding tool but with a hard cloth wheel. The steel begins to shine as he switches the knife from side to side and along each edge.

After careful inspection and a few hits to correct small imperfections, Wu places the knife upright in a vice. From a nearby drawer he pulls out a carved wooden handle and fits it onto the butt end with a single whack of the hammer. First insuring that the handle is solid, he then unwinds the vice, takes the knife over to a stationary belt sander and begins sharpening the edges. For the finishing touch, he positions the knife under a metal stamping machine and imprints his signature onto the steel blade. From bomb to knife, the entire process takes 14 minutes and 34 seconds.

Wu recently renamed his product line "Maestro Wu", and promotes the knives throughout the world.

"Right now, most of the Kinmen bomb-knife market is in Taiwan," he notes. "But I hope to sell them in mainland China as well. That would be a kick, to sell them back the steel they dropped on us!"

With an ever-ready smile, he hands me the knife he has just made and tells me to take it as a gift. Later I pack it together with six knives I've purchased and a bottle of Kinmen's fiery "Kaoliang" liquor. Then I board the plane back to Taipei.

Customs is going to love this.